My wife, Sydney Bristow
by Tiana K
Summary: What's Sydney hiding from Vaughn and will it tear their family apart?


Things never turn out the way you think they will.

I never intended to become a househusband. Stay - at - home husband. Full-time dad, whatever you want to call it- there is no good term for it. But that's what I had become in the last six months. Now I was in Crate & Barrel in downtown San Jose, picking up some extra glasses, and while I was there I noticed they had a good selection of placemats. We needed more placemats; the woven oval ones that Sydney had brought a year ago were getting pretty worn, and the weave was crusted in baby food. The trouble was they were woven, so you couldn't wash them. So I stopped at the display to see if they had any placemats that might be good, and I found some pale blue ones that were nice, and I got some white napkins. And then some yellow placemats caught my eye, because they looked really bright and appealing, so I got those too. They didn't have six on the shelf, and I thought we'd better have six, so I asked the sales girl to look in the back and see if they had more. While she was gone I put the placemat on the table, and put a white dish on it, and then I put a yellow napkin next to it. The setting looked very cheerful, and I began to think maybe I should get eight instead of six. That was when my cell phone rang.

It was Sydney. "Hi, hon."

"Hi, Syd. How's it going?"

She said, "What're you doing?"

"Buying placemats actually."

"Where?"

"Crate & Barrel."

She laughed. "You the only guy there?"

"No......"

"Oh, well that's good." She said. I could tell Sydney was completely uninterested in this conversation. Something else was on her mind. "Listen I wanted to tell you, Vaughn, I'm really sorry, but it's going to be a late night again."

"Uh – huh..." The sales girl came back, carrying more yellow mats. Still holding the phone to my ear, I beckoned her over. I held up three fingers, and she put down three more mats. To Sydney I said, "Is everything all right?"

"Yeah it's just crazy like normal. We're broadcasting a demo by satellite today to the VCs in Asia and Europe, and we're having trouble with the satellite hookup at this end because the video truck they sent – oh, you don't want to know...anyway, we're going to be delayed two hours, hon. Maybe more. I wont get back until eight the earliest. Can you feed the kids and put them to bed?"

"No problem," I said. And it wasn't. I was used to it. Lately Sydney had been working very long hours. Most nights she didn't get home until the children were asleep.

For a while I forgot what it is she actually does? Is she still working with the CIA? Is she still involved with the same agency I was a few months ago or has she changed jobs and forgotten to mention anything? All she ever does now is work, she practically lives at the office and when she's at home all we ever do is talk about, work. Don't get me wrong I know how tough it is, the job is very demanding and doesn't leave you with a lot of free time but I thought that now since we have a family, since we have two beautiful children that she would slow down and spend time with us. We had it all planed out, we'd get married, have a family, she'd quit her job with the CIA and become a fulltime mum than sometime down the track she'd try teaching. Sydney agreed and promised both me and her self that this was what she wanted; she'd prefer teaching to working with the CIA any day but instead she's the one that's still with the agency and I'm standing here in Crate & Barrel picking out placemats.

"Listen, Vaughn I want to warm you." She said, in a guilty voice, "That William is going to be upset.

"Why?"

"Well...I told him I would come to the game."

"Sydney, why? We talked about making promises like this. There's no way you can make it to the game. It's at three o'clock. Why'd you tell him you would?"

"I thought I could make it."

I sighed. It was, I told my self, a sign of her caring. "Okay. Don't worry honey. I'll handle it."

"Thanks. Oh, and Vaughn? The placemats? Whatever you do, just don't get yellow, okay?"

And she hung up.

I made spaghetti for dinner because there was never an argument about spaghetti. By eight o'clock, the little one was asleep, and Laura was finishing her homework. She was twelve, and had to be in bed by ten o'clock, though she didn't like any of her friends to know. The little one William was five years old, he was a soccer kid, and liked to play all the time, when he wasn't dressing up as a knight and chasing his older sister around the house with his plastic sword.

Laura was in a modest phase of her life; William likes nothing better than to grab her bra and go running around the house, shouting "Laura wears a bra-a! Laura wears a bra-a!" While Laura, too dignified to pursue him, gritted her teeth and yelled. "Dad? He's doing it again! Dad!" And I would have to go chase William and tell him not to touch his sister's things.

That's what my life had become. After years of working with the CIA, I quit my job and took on the role of taking care of the household and our family. Sydney and I got married a few months before Laura was due to be born it was the happiest time of our lives. Things were falling into place for once and everything was going like we wanted it to. Even though we were still with the agency and traveling back and forth every two days it didn't seem to bother us as long as we were together. About a year after my divorce from Lauren, Sydney sold her house and moved in with me. We lived at my place for a couple of months before getting engaged and finding out Sydney was pregnant.

Being a stay – at – home dad hasn't been that bad. There are days when I feel like giving up and disappearing for a few days. Sometimes the kids can be a pain in the ass and get too hard to handle, especially the older one; she's in the body of a twelve year old but acts like she's sixteen, very demanding a bit like her mother these days. But then there are day's when things run smoothly, days when the kids listen to every word that comes out of my mouth, day's when I can sit around drinking beer and watching the Kings thrash any team that gets in their way, days when my wife is home on time for once and is more than happy to do anything but work.

Speaking of work ever since I stopped working with Sydney and the CIA I haven't heard a single word about what's going on or what they're doing. And I know Sydney's only following the rules by not telling me or giving me any information about what it is she's working on but seeing as though she's my wife I kind of expected her to keep telling me what or who she's dealing with. These days I'm finding my self snooping through her things and laptop, trying to find out what it is she's doing or why she's constantly at the office. She knows I do it and it doesn't seem to bother her because I haven't been able to find anything, she's pretty good at hiding it. But two nights ago she went to bed and forgot about her briefcase. She left it open on the table and I couldn't resist. I picked out the first piece of paper which was on top of a pile of other files. I skim read it before realizing that Sydney's latest project is one we've both dealt with before, one that nearly killed me. By the information that was written in the statement, the Rambaldi Virus has resurfaced and a number of agents were exposed to it, one of those agents was my wife.

TBC


End file.
